I'm planning to cut down my activity on this site significantly, so I figured I'd share some closing thoughts before I go.
It's funny (read infuriating) seeing people playing the ideological purity game with Marxism of all things. Marx and Engels weren't religious leaders, they were intellectuals and political activists who wrote books. And all of the successful socialist movements thus-far have diverged from their thought in pretty significant ways. If we are to look at socialism as a science, then we should aim to test and revise our theories as we gain new information, not go "erm, okay, but what does Capital say about this". I can't count the number of times people have quote-mined Marx and Engels at me as if it were an argument, even though the quotes being mined were disproved by Mao nearly a century ago.
The power of free speech and free press is that it allows room for people to question things and come up with new theories that exist outside of mainstream thought. As such, they should be allowed to exist. However, this does not mean free speech and free press in the liberal sense, if only because neither of them makes any sense under socialism. No, under socialism, mainstream media and the internet will be heavily censored indeed, since there's no point to giving air time to disinformation, or even just stuff the public doesn't want to see. But when speaking face to face, or handing a paper you printed to a friend, one should be given a great degree of freedom.
Marxists will make fun of you for bringing up morality, but I still think it's good to have some kind of ethics guiding your action; not because it's metaphysically necessary, but because it's practical. Something like Utilitarianism, for example, gives you a yardstick by which to judge your actions, saving a ton of time that would otherwise be spent mulling over stupid questions like "will backwards baseball caps be allowed under socialism?".
Speaking of philosophical shit, I used to be a Nietzschean, but over time I've come to strongly disagree with him on the important stuff. I do, however, think that there is something to be said for ressentiment, even if his conception of it makes no sense. Vengefulness is a wasteful, childish behavior that attributes a legitimacy and humanity to the enemy that it doesn't deserve. I don't want evil people to suffer, I want them instantly dead, wiped off the face of the planet as fast as humanly possible.
People here seem to be in general agreement that one's interests, and thus actions, are influenced by class position, but will balk at the suggestion that the same logic extends to political class. This is why, broad-strokes, I'm an advocate for participatory democracy. To be clear, I'm aware that republicanism has its upsides, but I don't see why those upsides can't be combined with a participatory system. Have the legislature composed of randomly selected citizens, and the executive comprised of elected politicians; there, problem solved.
>>2324613>The power of free speech and free press is that it allows room for people to question things and come up with new theories that exist outside of mainstream thought. As such, they should be allowed to exist. However, this does not mean free speech and free press in the liberal sense, if only because neither of them makes any sense under socialism. No, under socialism, mainstream media and the internet will be heavily censored indeed, since there's no point to giving air time to disinformation, or even just stuff the public doesn't want to see. But when speaking face to face, or handing a paper you printed to a friend, one should be given a great degree of freedom.Simpler approach would be to say that there would be no centralized platforms to begin with. The conditions that made centralized social media and web crawlers a thing were very much only possible under capitalism.
There would be no need to waste resources censoring a town square that doesn't need to exist in the first place.
>about dogmatism
I generally agree but my stance is that if you disagree with a piece of theory you should formulate your arguments. If you disagree with a statement from these thinkers, there's a high likelihood that you're flat-out incorrect or at least lacking important context. Not because they're infallible, rather because their positions have been argued and conterargued to hell and back and dismissing them with no evidence or developed argument is akin to dismissing a scientific theory: you *could* be correct, but are you really? Such discussions on here will get heated and denegrate into shit-flinging because it's an imageboard, but still. Insert here the obligatory asterisk about historical contexts and material necessities and idyosincracy.
>on free speech
I believe you're preaching to the choir there.
>on morality
It's good for optics if nothing else. Overall a waste of time though. You described yourself as a former Nietzschean, so you should know that morality is dictated by the ruling class and, if/when proletarians are in power, morality will be proletarian. Nothing we discuss, agree or disagree on, will make any difference.
>on ressentiment
There's a more elaborate discussion here to be had regarding praxis guided by "class hatred" (Socialists of the 20th Century such as Lenin) versus a colder, dettached, self-serving approach (a position more similar to Marx and others such as Stirner). I'm an advocate for always removing, abstracting, and ignoring morally and emotionally charged action because it's often blinds people from what has to be done and what is on the horizon, in general terms, but I'm not sure if this is possible for us as a species.
>I don't want evil people to suffer
Most Socialists don't, either. Leftypol is kind of an outlier in that sense, where some anons are calling for reactionaries to be raped and tortured. I don't think they're the majority, and here is as antisocial as a leftist space can be.
>on bureaucrats
I don't think this is a polemic either but do keep in mind that this makes a State much more fragile in a Capitalist world. A "Socialist" nation will not be representative of its future Communist order.
>>2324834Because it's the only sure way to guarantee that a centralized political elite cannot form. For what it's worth, with sortition, an individual would likely spend very little of their life actually participating in politics.
>>2324836Ideological dick measuring strikes again! No refutation, just
>This idea is not le kosher for kommunism >:(We love to see it.
>The power of free speech and free press is that it allows room for people to question things and come up with new theories that exist outside of mainstream thought. As such, they should be allowed to exist. However, this does not mean free speech and free press in the liberal sense, if only because neither of them makes any sense under socialism. No, under socialism, mainstream media and the internet will be heavily censored indeed, since there's no point to giving air time to disinformation, or even just stuff the public doesn't want to see. But when speaking face to face, or handing a paper you printed to a friend, one should be given a great degree of freedom.
>Marxists will make fun of you for bringing up morality, but I still think it's good to have some kind of ethics guiding your action; not because it's metaphysically necessary, but because it's practical. Something like Utilitarianism, for example, gives you a yardstick by which to judge your actions, saving a ton of time that would otherwise be spent mulling over stupid questions like "will backwards baseball caps be allowed under socialism?".
I mostly agree with these. My enemies DO deserve to suffer though and revenge and hatred is good.
>>2325769>>2325775Please reread my post.
I said that ethics were important as a tool, not as an end to themselves. Mao was one of the most successful revolutionaries in the history of Marxism, so I don't understand why deferring to him, rather than Marx and Engels who were only alive to see the Paris Commune, something they had no direct participation in. The only philosopher I brought up was Nietzsche, and it was in large part to denounce him.
Beyond that, how are the points I raised wrong? Please explain to me. I know you don't have answer by the way. Extraordinarily unhelpful people like you make up an unfortunately large part of this sites userbase, and are a big factor in me leaving.
>inb4 good, leaveI was planning on it.
>And all of the successful socialist movements thus-far have diverged from their thought in pretty significant ways.
They never really wrote much on "how to do socialism" except for reaffirming the need for an international, proletarian revolution against people like Lassalle. The debates on labor value all come from liberal economists. Specific quotes from Marx emphasized the creativity of the proletariat when it comes to action, in far contrast to idealogues that live online here/reddit.
>socialism as a science
Engels called it scientific socialism as part of an argument against Duhring when they defined utopian socialism as religious thinking. It's not meant to be literal, like you go in a lab.
>we should aim to test and revise our theories as we gain new information
What exactly in Capital are you talking about? It is true that Marx lived during the industrial revolution, so some of the urgency about the proletariat starving to death on slave wages have become obsolete (yes, it is because otherwise we'd be seeing more wildcat worker action) but that's not what Capital is about. You're a maoist so I'm certain you haven't actually dealt with Capital that much, because no maoist I've ever seen does.
>disproved by Mao nearly a century ago.
No investigation no right to speak
>The power of free speech and free press is that it allows room for people to question things
No. Marxist theory came during a time of massive censorship. Free speech serves an ideological purpose of sublimating ideas until they're gutless, like socialism.
>new theories that exist outside of mainstream thought
Maoism is super-duper obscure and wasn't a big fad in the 60s. Nope.
>No, under socialism, mainstream media and the internet will be heavily censored indeed
lol. Under "socialism" we're going to keep a close eye on CNN and other corporate news that apparently still exists.
>But when speaking face to face, or handing a paper you printed to a friend, one should be given a great degree of freedom.
Now you don't even support free press. The idea that you have to specify people are given this "right" means you're theorizing a system more oppressive than what came before because in those systems, your thoughts can't be a crime.
>I still think it's good to have some kind of ethics guiding your action
Morality is useless in terms of historical materialism because it's just a product of the world it exists within. It doesn't explain anything outside of it. Theses on Feuerbach.
>Something like Utilitarianism…
Which Marx explicitly ridiculed Jeremy Bentham for because utilitarianism only justifies the status quo, ie liberalism. Utilitarianism didn't invent helping people. Utilitarianism has an infinite capacity for justifying itself, which is why Marx made fun of it.
>I used to be a Nietzschean, but over time I've come to strongly disagree with him
I'm guessing right now you read some will to power quotes from his Nazi sister and decided to remove that from your ideology shopping cart. Speaking of power, one of the appeals of Marxist socialist theory is that it emphasizes the power of the working class, especially under a dictatorship of the proletariat. It doesn't fall for bourgeois socialist Christian moralism.
>I don't want evil people to suffer, I want them instantly dead, wiped off the face of the planet as fast as humanly possible.
Okay?
>People here seem to be in general agreement that one's interests, and thus actions, are influenced by class position
Marxism doesn't argue that one's class (determined by social relations) predicts their behavior by itself.
>but will balk at the suggestion that the same logic extends to political class
The what now? Politics serve bourgeois interests and the tiny "working class wins" are just there to stop uprisings and chaos. This is why succdems are conservatives.
>I'm an advocate for participatory democracy
Direct democracy is a utopian idea because that's not how the world works when production is on such a massive scale. Can you imagine getting everyone on a train together to vote won when to pull the brake before the next stop? There is a clear reason the council form was always erected immediately after anarchist or communist revolutions. Also, ignoring that, we have now moved from socialism to wanting a different form of liberal governance.
So a tiny bit of constructive criticism. Nobody should go on forums with the intent to learn anything. You seem to desire a community that will teach you everything by browsing posts. This doesn't exist. This is because people who spend all their time here talking about how much they want to have sex with Hasan don't actually study or do critical thinking (they move with the herd or get banned, which is something I agree with you about forums). I know this is your case because you're dropping the "if Marx was so smart, how come he didn't lead a revolution" which completely misses the value that people get from Marxist theory. Referencing Capital in relation the context of revolutions is proof.
As for Mao, his military writings have a lot of value but I'm just going to say
>national bourgeois
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